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The Spanish capital of eastern Yucatán, founded in 1545, has at its heart one of the most charming of the region’s colonial plazas – wonderful for people-watching – overlooked by the tall white cathedral. Valladolid is celebrated for embroidery, and the square is a good place to buy the white, flower-patterned huípil dresses and tablecloths. Around the town there are many more fine old Spanish churches and houses, and just four blocks from the plaza you can look down into the dramatic pit of Cenote Zací, once Valladolid’s water source.

This massive, fortress-like church and cloister was begun in 1552, and is the oldest permanent church in the Yucatán. Like others built around that time, it was designed by the Franciscan order’s own architect, Friar Juan de Mérida. It looks very medieval, with an unusual, beautifully shady gallery of graceful arches along the façade and a cloister of giant, squat stone columns around an exuberantly overgrown garden. Church and cloister have a delightful tranquility, and inside there are rare 18th-century Baroque altars and altarpieces.

This is the most spectacular of the easily accessible, swim-mable cenotes, and one of the great sights of the Yucatán. Entering through a cramped tunnel, you emerge into a vast, cathedral-like cavern, with towers of strangely shaped rock around an exquisite turquoise pool. In the middle, a shaft of sunlight falls dead straight onto the water from a hole in the roof. Everyone automatically swims through it, to be touched by this magical light.

In 1998 excavations revealed some of the finest examples of Mayan sculpture at these ruins, on the giant temple-mound known as the Acropolis. Most spectacular is El Trono (The Throne), a temple entrance believed to be the tomb of Ukit-Kan-Lek-Tok, a powerful ruler around AD 800. Nearby is an intricate mass of finely carved figures. The rest of the Acropolis is a multi-level palace.

Ek-Balam

This great labyrinthine complex of caves extends several miles under the Yucatán forest. Caves were sacred for the ancient Maya and, in one spectacular chamber, the sanctuary, remains were found of over 100 ritual incense burners. The compulsory tour ends in a magical chamber with a perfectly still pool, in which the cave bottom seen through the water is a mirror image of the roof.

The most famous and awe-inspiring of all the great ancient Mayan cities, and the one with the most spine-tingling images of war and sacrifice. The great pyramid of El Castillo, the giant Ball Court, the Sacred Cenote, and the Temple of the Warriors are all must-sees.

This quiet village on the remote north coast is at the head of over 20 km (12 miles) of man-grove lagoon and mud flats, with the Yucatán’s largest colonies of flamingos and a dazzling variety of other birds. Local boatmen provide good-value tours (see also Río Lagartos, Río Lagartos and San Felipe).

West of Río Lagartos, this village is smaller and has a superb, usually near-empty beach on the sandbar across the lagoon, facing the opal waters of the Gulf of Mexico. Village boatmen will ferry you to and from the beach, and also offer flamingo tours. From the village there are fabulous sunsets (see also Río Lagartos, Río Lagartos and San Felipe).

The most unaltered Spanish colonial city in the Yucatán, known as the ciudad dorada or “Golden City” because of the color of its buildings, is centered on the huge monastery of San Antonio, begun in 1549 as the headquarters of the Franciscan friars in Yucatán and the shrine of Our Lady of Izamal, the region’s patron. A short walk away are the remains of three pyramids, traces of a much older Mayan city (see also Izamal, San Antonio de Padua, Izamal).

Far west of San Felipe, a road joins the coast to run along it through quiet fishing villages. Seaward, there are endless, often empty, Gulf Coast beaches, while on the landward side is a lagoon full of birds. Telchac is a fishing harbor with fine beaches and a few low-key restaurants and cheap hotels. At Uaymitún there is a free observation tower for bird-watching in the lagoon (see Uaymitún).